STÉPHANE DENÈVE

Stéphane Denève, who grew up in the far north of France, says hisfirst performance as a conductor happened very early on. “There wasa conducting class at my local conservatoire and, thanks to alreadybeing quite tall at 13 and having a persuasive mother, the teacheraccepted me even though, officially, I was too young. I conducted ashort piece in concert on my 14th birthday,” he shares. “And I havenever stopped conducting since.” Denève went on to study at theParis Conservatoire, and it was in the city that he would get his firstcareer break, becoming an assistant to Sir Georg Solti at the ParisOpera. After Leonard Slatkin, conductor laureate of the St. LouisSymphony Orchestra, saw Denève performing with the Paris Operawhen he was still in his 20s, he was so impressedthat he facilitated Denève’s first Americanappearance at the National Symphony Orchestrain Washington, D.C. And this year, Denève,already the music director of the BrusselsPhilharmonic, will step into the same role for theSt. Louis Symphony Orchestra, where his goal isto craft a distinctive sound and colorful identityand engage in a lively dialogue with the audience.

“Maybe because I started my career as an opera
conductor, I love to be very narrative and to tell
stories in music,” Denève says of his charismatic
approach. “Really, I think that music is the
shortest way from one heart to another.”

Last things you listened to that really movedyou:The composer Michel Legrand just died, andmy dear friend Jean-Yves Thibaudet played me a piano piece that Legrandcomposed especially for him. It was gorgeous and very touching. I also justlistened to a recording of Strauss’ Metamorphosen while I was in Dresden,a tragic piece written at the end of the Second World War. I thought of thiscity being destroyed and now it’s rebuilt, and you can hear the birds sing-ing again. And the sound of my daughter’s voice during the premiere ofher play in which she had the main role. It was certainly music to my ears.

The piece you’d love to tackle as a conductor:I’m afraid I’m
old enough to have already conducted all the music I dreamed of
conducting. What I dream now is to premiere a masterwork in my
lifetime that will enrich humanity forever. [

JAAP VAN ZWEDEN

Before Jaap Van Zweden earned international accolades and acclaim
as a conductor, he was earning them as a violinist. “My earliest
musical memory is watching my father play piano with gypsy violinists in our home,” Van Zweden says. “I was fascinated by the violin,
and that inspired me to start taking lessons at age 7.” Van Zweden’s
immense talent got him into Juilliard at 16. Then, at 19, he was
named the concertmaster of the Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra in
his hometown of Amsterdam, the youngest musician to hold the post.

Twenty years into a massively successful career as a violinist, it would
be Leonard Bernstein who nudged Van Zweden toward conducting.

“I was on tour with the Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra, and he
was conducting and asked me to take over so that
he could go out into the hall and listen,” he recalls.

“When I said I had never conducted and couldn’t do
it, he replied with, ‘Just do it.’ You didn’t say no to
Lenny. When we had finished, he told me that my
conducting was pretty bad but that he saw something in me and I should work on it. So, my journey
as a conductor started at age 38.” Since then, Van
Zweden has guest conducted the Chicago Symphony
Orchestra, the Cleveland Orchestra and the Vienna
and Berlin philharmonics. He has held the role of
music director of the Hong Kong Philharmonic
since 2012 (which he will continue), and last year
he was named the music director of the New York
Philharmonic. “It’s an honor to be appointed to the
same orchestra that once had Bernstein, Toscanini
and Mahler as its music directors.”

Pre-performance ritual:I take five small steps in the wings before
setting foot on stage.

The piece you’d love to tackle as a conductor: That would have
been the entire Ring cycle of Wagner, which I very happily have just
completed with the Hong Kong Symphony. And we also recorded this
entire Ring for Naxos Records.

Last things you listened to that really moved you:Conducting
Bach’s St. Matthew Passion for the first time, a lecture by Oliver
Sacks about the brain, the movie A Star is Born with Lady Gaga and
Bradley Cooper.

"I love to tellstories in music.Really, I thinkthat musicis the shortest wayfrom one heartto another."